STUDENT TEAM FROM CONNECTICUT’S NAUGATUCK HIGH SCHOOL
NAMES NOAA’S NEW COASTAL MAPPING VESSEL
Team to Be Invited to Keel Laying Ceremony

A
team of four students and their biology teacher from Naugatuck High
School in Naugatuck, Conn., has won the “Name NOAA’s New
Ship” contest. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
selected the entry “Ferdinand R. Hassler” for
a 124-foot Small Waterplane Area Twin Hull (SWATH) coastal mapping
vessel that is currently under construction in Mississippi. Hassler
was a key player in NOAA’s earliest history.

“We
are extremely pleased with the student team’s choice of name.
It is a particularly appropriate selection during NOAA’s 200th
celebration of science and service to the nation, as Ferdinand Hassler
was appointed in 1807 as the first superintendent of the Coast Survey.
The Survey was the nation’s first federal science agency and
NOAA traces its earliest roots back to it,” said retired Navy
Vice Admiral Conrad
C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D, under secretary of commerce for oceans
and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “The contest was designed
to encourage students to learn more about their oceans, coasts, and
maritime history, and the Naugatuck High School team presented an
outstanding recommendation.”

The team of four 10th-grade students,
led by biology teacher Beth A. Lancaster, includes Michelina Cioffi,
Scott Dyer, Mark Lee, and Steven Plante. They will be invited to attend
the ship’s keel laying ceremony at the VT Halter Marine shipyard
in Moss Point, Miss.—where the ship is currently under construction—on
June 15. Mrs. Catherine Sununu, wife of Senator John Sununu of New
Hampshire, is sponsor of the ship and will participate in the ceremony.
Additionally, a senior NOAA official will visit the school in the
fall and present it with a duplicate keel plate from the ship.

Since
September 2003, NOAA has been using its fleet modernization program
to promote science education and ocean literacy by including students
and teachers in the ship naming process. Thousands of students have
participated in the contests sponsored by the NOAA Office of Education
and learned more about NOAA’s important scientific research.
Ferdinand R. Hassler is the fourth NOAA vessel named through
a contest.

Working in teams of four to eight students,
contest participants research one name of their choosing for the ship,
and write an essay to support their selection. Essays are judged on
imagination and creativity, evidence of educational value, and ocean
literacy.

This
latest contest was open to students in middle and high schools throughout
New England. Ferdinand R. Hassler will be homeported in New
Castle, N.H., once it becomes operational in 2008. NOAA is a partner
of the Center for Coastal and
Ocean Mapping and the Joint Hydrographic Center, a University
of New Hampshire/NOAA Cooperative Institute, based at the university.

Ferdinand
R. Hassler is the first coastal mapping vessel of its design
built for NOAA in support of the agency’s National Ocean Service.
The ship will continue in the tradition of the earliest surveys of
the nation’s waterways spearheaded by its namesake. Its primary
mission will be to map the full seafloor in coastal areas for the
nation’s nautical charts. The vessel’s ability to monitor
and detect changes to the seafloor—including obstructions, shoaling,
and other dangers to navigation—will enhance the nation’s
commerce and security and improve NOAA’s ability to characterize
marine ecosystems.

Ferdinand Hassler was a Swiss immigrant
whose scientific skill, strength of character, and indomitable nature
guided the Coast Survey through many difficult times until his death
in 1843. Hassler left a thriving organization imbued with principles
of scientific accuracy, standards, and integrity as his gift to the
American people. His legacy directly influenced 200 years of hydrographic
surveys and the creation of NOAA.

NOAA’s
Office of Marine and Aviation Operations operates, manages and maintains
the NOAA fleet of research and survey ships and aircraft. OMAO is
composed of civilians and commissioned officers of the NOAA Corps,
one of the nation’s seven uniformed services. NOAA Corps officers–all
scientists or engineers– provide NOAA with an important blend
of operational, management and technical skills that support NOAA’s
mission at sea, in the air and ashore. To learn more about OMAO and
the NOAA Corps, please visit http://www.nmao.noaa.gov.

The
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, an agency of the
U.S. Commerce Department, is
celebrating 200 years
of science and service to the nation. From the establishment of
the Survey of the Coast in 1807 by Thomas Jefferson to the formation
of the Weather Bureau and the Commission of Fish and Fisheries in
the 1870s, much of America's scientific heritage is rooted in NOAA.

NOAA
is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through
the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events
and information service delivery for transportation, and by providing
environmental stewardship of our nation's coastal and marine resources.
Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS),
NOAA is working with its federal partners, more than 60 countries
and the European Commission to develop a global monitoring network
that is as integrated as the planet it observes, predicts and protects.